Laser and electronic imaging technologies have been used for many years in many product manufacturing applications, particularly for quality control involving numerous types of measurement such as dimension, shape, profile or surface characteristics such as roughness and presence of defects. Typically, measurements are based on the well known laser triangulation ranging principle involving a direct relationship between the distance separating a reference plane and a given point of the surface of an object under inspection as measured along an axis extending in a direction perpendicular to the surface in one hand, and the reflected light being shifted from a corresponding reference position as observed at the imaging sensor or camera location in the other hand. Thus, following an appropriate calibration step, profile data as defined by series of calculated distance values for corresponding points on the surface can be directly derived from light beam shifts measurements. A known calibration approach consists of currently establishing the correspondence between each pixel position coordinates provided at the imaging sensor within an image reference system and the spatial position coordinates of any point located within an inspection area delimited by the optical field of view of the imaging sensor or camera and the illumination plane defined by the laser beam and with respect to a world or object reference system, using a mathematical camera model such as proposed by Roger Tsai in “A versatile camera calibration technique for High-Accuracy 3D machine vision metrology using off-the-shelf TV cameras and lenses”, IEEE Journal of Robotics and Automation, Vol. RA-3, No. 4, August 1987, which model is calibrated from position coordinates data obtained through initial measurements using a calibration target of either of the coplanar or non-coplanar type. A non-coplanar calibration target consists of a structure defining a three-dimensional arrangement of reference points having known position coordinates within a three-dimensional reference system associated with such structure. In use, the structure is accurately disposed in a camera calibration position with respect to the three coordinates axis of the reference system and with respect to the illumination plane defined by the laser source beam. The use of non-coplanar calibration targets may be required in certain cases where an unknown optical parameter such as scale factor uncertainty, has to be estimated. However, they require simultaneous and precise alignment with respect to all three coordinates axis of the reference system, whereas coplanar calibration targets require precise alignment with respect to only two coordinates axis of the same reference system. Known coplanar and non-coplanar camera calibration targets are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,621,921 B1, U.S. Pat. No. 6,437,823 B1 and U.S. Pat. No. 6,195,455 B1. Although coplanar camera calibration targets are less arduous to align with the illuminating plane defined by the laser source as compared with non-coplanar calibration targets, the alignment still remains a critical operation in order to achieve the measurement accuracy requirements. Therefore, there is still a need for improved coplanar calibration targets as well as apparatus and method using such improved targets exhibiting ease of operation while insuring high position coordinates measurement accuracy.